************************************************************* HAVE FUN WITH THE FUTURE. INTELLIGENT CLOTHING, ARTIFICIAL LIFE AND INTERACTIVE SPACES BLEND AT TXOOM! ************************************************************* FUTURE PHYSICAL 'WEAR ME!!!' ARTS & TECHNOLOGY PROGRAMME BRINGS UK PREMIER EVENT TO GREAT YARMOUTH. Ever imagined being inside a dream-like space, which grows and evolves depending on your actions? You can do it for real if you participate in an exciting public event called txOom. txOom is having its UK premier in Great Yarmouth at the Hippodrome Circus Space between Sunday 1st and Sun 8th December. This is a fantastic opportunity for people to come and explore the future of interactive spaces and smart fabrics. Visitors will be able to play with visuals, tangle in textiles and influence the audio and visual environment around them by the way they move and interact with the space. For detail info on txOom visit http://fo.am/txoom The event runs from 11am - 6pm from 1st, - 3rd and 5th - 7th December , from 1pm - 8pm on 4th December and 11 - 3pm on 8th December. Tickets cost £4/£2 concessions for 30 minute sessions. Box office: 01493 844172. Only 8 people per session. Please try to book in advance. For all ages 5yrs +. From 18th - 22nd December, an important part of the project is being developed through the interaction with the local communities in Great Yarmouth - - through creative user workshops with the aim to research the involvement, playfulness, creativity and learning in responsive environments through 6 daily workshops involving 3 professional artistic groups and 3 community groups including single mothers, young offenders and adults with learning difficulties through a co-operation with Great Yarmouth based organisation, SeaChange The tx0om apprenticeship scheme awarded to SeaChange selects 5 regional, national and international artists to shadow the tx0om developers through the set up and public presentations. International/national and regional artists can participate in a Systems Demo Intensive on 28/29th November 2002 for an in-depth overview of how the system works and input on areas of tx0om research. ************************************************************* WEAR ME!!! MARKETPLACE ************************************************************* On Saturday 7th December the WEAR ME!!! Marketplace comes to The Forum in Norwich - a chance to check out the future of digital clothing, wearable gadgets and smart textiles. You'll see the latest hardware and soft-wearable prototypes, products and equipment demos by international artists and innovative electronics and textile companies. Find out what you might be wearing on your body in the not too distant future! The WEAR ME!!! Marketplace runs from 9.30am - 6.00pm and features equipment demos from : Mr Blinky (UK), Martin Kusch (Can), Thecla Schiphorst (Can), Yacov Sharir (US), Nick Stedman (Can), Rachel Wingfield (UK), Sha Xin Wei (US) and Xybernaut (Germany) plus commercial stalls by innovative electronics and textile companies. Buy or view its up to you. **THE BLANKET PROJECT** Also in Norwich on 5th-8th December is Canadian artists Nick Steadman's contribution to WEAR ME!!! 'The Blanket Project'. This commission lets visitors experience a reactive object, for free inside a shop front, which is opposite Norwich Arts Centre - see www.futurephysical.org for full details. **For press enquiries please Chris Birch or Philippa Norman at Galactic PR. Tel: 0208 960 8606 / 4596 or email chris@galacticpr.com** ************************************************************* WEAR ME!!! KEYNOTE SPEECH ************************************************************* To open the WEAR ME!!! programme is a Keynote speech on future visions of digital body interfaces with renowned international artist/technologist, Thecla Shiphorst (Associate Professor, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver) Venue: Norwich School of Art and Design, Lecture Theatre Dates: Thursday 5th December Tickets: £3 Times: 7.30pm Other Details: limited public places, please purchase ticket on the door ************************************************************* WEAR ME!!! INTERCHANGE ************************************************************* We are taking registrations for the Wear Me!!! InterChange, an intensive 3-day exchange in and around Norwich for artists, computing and fashion and public to debate and view topical developments and innovations in wearable computing and smart textiles. Sign up to participate in working groups, lecture demos and networking, plus programme presentations, film showings and all WEAR ME!!! public events. Venue: Norwich Arts Centre/University of East Anglia Dates: 5 - 8th Dec 2002 Tickets: £120 / £65 conc includes tickets to all activities including all public events SIGN UP NOW AT: http://www.futurephysical.org/pages/content/wearable/nex.html ************************************************************* FUTURE PHYSICAL. STRETCHING TECHNOLOGY, A HUMAN ADVENTURE. ************************************************************* txOom is developed by FoAM VzW in collaboration with Time'sUp (Austria), Future Physical (UK), Interactive Institute (Sweden), KIBLA (Slovenia) and several independent artists and technologists. txOom is part of a larger series of events and activities called WEAR ME!!!, a Future Physical focus on wearable computing and smart textiles in Norwich and Great Yarmouth in December 2002. For full details of all WEAR ME!!! events, and other Future Physical events, register at the web site www.futurephysical.org, or call 020 7357 0824. Future Physical (shinkansen/East England Arts) is a cultural programme exploring the changing boundaries between the body and technology, taking place throughout East England across December 2002 - April 2003. txOom - Editors Notes txOom is a responsive PlaySpace, where the participants are invited to actively take part in transforming the media environment; shaping the sound, playing with visuals, tangling in textiles, and thereby molding their own experiences. The name, 'txOom' is an amalgam of the words "textile" and "bloom", the two terms guiding the aesthetic and the technological research of the project. The txOom spaces are as flexible, malleable and interconnected as fibres in a textile, with an ability to grow, evolve and unfold like plants in bloom. The goal of txOom developers is to design an 'action landscape' (a place formed by the actions and behaviours of people in it) in which the participants can have an experience of adventure. The playSpace is composed of several wearable architectural elements including wall-shirts, swing-dresses and floor-skirts. By wearing these garments, the participants literally wear the txOom space, causing the physical environment to be reshaped by their activity in it. This activity influences the shape of the physical environment as a whole, simultaneously inciting growth and mutation in the media worlds. Each player is sensed by the playSpace using motion sensors and vision tracking systems incorporated into the fabric of the space. Gradually, the social interaction between the participants, the responsive sound and visuals projected throughout the PlaySpace will change and evolve as they begin to play together. For press enquiries please Chris Birch or Philippa Norman at Galactic PR. Tel: 0208 960 8606 / 4596 or email chris@galacticpr.com txOom Credits txOom is developed by FoAM VzW in collaboration with Time'sUp (Austria), Future Physical (UK), Interactive Institute (Sweden), KIBLA (Slovenia) and several independent artists and technologists. **MAJOR FUNDING SUPPORT** Culture 2000 Programme of the European Union. Ministry of the Flemish Community, Belgium. Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture, The Netherlands. FUTURE PHYSICAL (East England Arts/shinkansen in association with the Arts Council of England New Audience Programme), UK, Cieffe Benelux ************************************************************* txOom is based on the TGarden system (copyright sponge, FoAM and associates) for detailed credits see http://fo.am/txoom/credits.html Creative User Research is a collaboration between shinkansen, Future Physical, FoAM VzW and SeaChange with funding assistance from Culture 2000 framework of the European Commission and Arts Council Development Programme 'PlayGarden'. **GENERAL CREDITS** Future Physical is a cultural programme co-conceived by shinkansen and East England Arts, produced by shinkansen/Future Physical Ltd for East England Arts. WEAR ME!!! Is a co-production between Future Physical (shinkansen/East England Arts), Plan B, f0.am and Norwich Arts Centre in co-operation with SeaChange, Magna, Xybernaut and The Forum with funding assistance from Culture 2000 framework of the European Commission, Arts Council National Touring Programme and PlayGarden. ************************************************************* For press enquiries please Chris Birch or Philippa Norman at Galactic PR. Tel: 0208 960 8606 / 4596 or email chris@galacticpr.com